


my bones on your bones

by tosca1390



Category: Bridgerton Series - Julia Quinn
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-13
Updated: 2014-01-13
Packaged: 2018-01-08 14:16:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1133634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tosca1390/pseuds/tosca1390
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>She wants him to understand her unwavering affection with a ferocity beyond bearing.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	my bones on your bones

**Author's Note:**

  * For [magisterequitum](https://archiveofourown.org/users/magisterequitum/gifts), [empressearwig](https://archiveofourown.org/users/empressearwig/gifts), [spyglass](https://archiveofourown.org/users/spyglass/gifts).



> Immediately post-When He Was Wicked. #whoops
> 
> For Jordan, Jess, Grace, et al.

*

“You still have a fever,” Francesca says as they walk down the hill back towards the house, her hand tucked into his. There is a flush on her cheeks and a secret smile on her lips, and she feels as if she has finally shaken off the dust of the last three years and brought herself back to life. 

Michael stops and pulls her into his arms, the rain misty and cool against her skin. Her face tucks right into the curve of his throat and it feels wonderful. His skin is still frightfully warm and she places a cool damp hand to the nape of his neck, her fingers curling in the dark hair there. 

“Michael, really – “

“Frannie, please,” he murmurs near her ear. She can hear the smile in his voice. “I want to enjoy this.”

“Surely you can enjoy it from the comforts of your bed with a bowl of soup,” she says. 

His hand sinks into her swept-up, rain-damp hair. The pins from yesterday remain; she feels every brush of his fingers against her scalp as he pulls them from her hair. “You love me,” he says, as if he does not believe it. As if he cannot believe it. 

There are a multitude of hurts she has imagined and experienced in her life, all of twenty-seven. Losing her husband so young, and losing Michael in a similar fashion if not so permanently at the same time; a miscarriage, the sheer loneliness of widowhood – but never has she lived in the shadows of doubt and frustration in the way Michael has. Certain of her place in many hearts – excepting perhaps his, but Francesca understands that better now – whereas he has felt utterly alone. There is no winner in all of this; she wants him to understand her unwavering affection with a ferocity beyond bearing.

“I love you,” she echoes, voice warm. She is not a demonstrative soul, especially since her widowhood. But even before John’s death and Michael’s abrupt journey to India, she was the quiet one. Oh, she of course engaged in the shenanigans of youth; one couldn’t be a Bridgerton without shenanigans. But even so, she knows people thought of her as something other, something different in the midst of all her siblings. 

It took John time to see through the quiet and her enjoyment of solitude to the heart of her. Michael always seemed to know. 

“I love you,” she repeats for both their benefits, tipping her head back to meet his eyes. 

His smile is wide, spreads across that still-tan face until she cannot bear the brightness of it. “I will never tire of hearing it.”

In response, she presses up on her tiptoes and kisses his happy mouth, there in the midst of the summer rain and the Scotland fog. The house is just yards away but she could not move her feet if she was paid a thousand pounds. 

“Bed,” she breathes out against his eager lips before his hands begin to wander from her waist and hair. “For bed, for to sleep.”

He smoothes her hair away from her throat. “I am fine.”

“My love does not have healing powers,” she teases. “And I want you well once more.”

His eyes brighten. “Have you plans for me, wife?”

A shiver runs down her spine at his words, at the possession in his tone. “You had mentioned something about being tied up,” she says slyly. If he likes the wanton in her, then by god she will embrace it, for she likes it too. 

“Jesus,” he mutters, a low sound ripping from his throat. “I meant you.”

“Turnabout is fair play, husband,” she says, taking his hand in hers and leading him towards the front steps of the house. 

He is suspiciously quiet as she takes him back into the house and up to the bedchamber they may as well call theirs, as she never sleeps without him, excepting last night. As she shuffles about the room, tucking the fresh sheets up around his shoulders and fixing him tea and a cold compress, he watches her with that heavy dark gaze. She isn’t quite sure of what to make of it, but he is cooperating at last. A relief. 

Abruptly, he catches her hand in his warm one as she passes by his side. “Frannie, stop fussing,” he says, gaze clear. 

She falters, tucking her fingers between his. “Oh. Well – “

“Come lay down with me,” he says. He looks younger than she’s ever known him, mouth soft and dark hair falling over his brow. 

“I’m a fright,” she murmurs, toeing off her boots. 

“You’re beautiful and you’re mine,” he says, nearly stealing the breath right from her lungs. 

Smiling slightly, she circles to the other side of the bed and settles on top of the bedspread, stretched out on her side next to him. He turns his head to look at her and smiles, bringing her knuckles to his mouth for a kiss. 

“I could spend forever here with you,” he says hoarsely. 

“You can,” she says, and kisses his cheek. 

*

She and Michael remain in Scotland for the time being, and she is relieved beyond words. The hustle and bustle of the city has never appealed to her; indeed, she really only ever ventured back to London to see her family. Michael says he is perfectly content to remain in Scotland for as long as she wants, and she takes him at his word. He was never one for society, as she recalls. 

The letters from her family and his concerning their marriage trickle up to them slowly. Her mother is effusive in her pleasure, and Francesca can tell its sincerity. Anthony writes her on his own as well, and writes his approval. Eloise writes extensively on both of their abrupt marriages and scolds Francesca for not being more revealing concerning the joys of sexual congress, which makes Francesca laugh right out loud. John’s mother and Michael’s mother are both wonderfully understanding and pleased, and will visit when they are requested to come. 

(Not yet, she thinks with a blush. There are too many rooms still left to christen, in Michael’s words.)

It is Colin’s letter that perplexes her. Indeed, Colin has never been much of a correspondent. They have grown closer in the time since her widowhood, with his frequent visits to the Scottish estate, but he was never much for epistolary conversation. 

“He said, ‘you’re welcome,’” she says to Michael as she sits at her writing desk. Mid-morning sun streams in through the open drapes of her study, a blue sky peeking out over the trees. It always feels like a blessing to have blue skies and sunlight, even in the summer when it is expected. She loves the mist and the rain, but sun in August is only appropriate. 

Sitting on the small settee opposite her desk, Michael glances at her over the top of his week-old newspaper. “Really.”

“What on earth does he mean?” she asks, arching an eyebrow. 

“Haven’t the foggiest,” he says with a grin, tossing his newspaper to the other cushion. His health now perfect, he looks ruddy and charming in the sunlight. His India tan has finally faded; she might miss it just a bit, but not enough for him to go that far away from her ever again. 

Here, at this desk, she had sat day after day and scratched out letter after letter to him, held the three letters he had sent her from across the globe close to her heart. They are here still, tucked into the drawer to her right. Here, she had thrown each tear-stained missive into the fire, because no words seemed strong enough. Nothing ever sounded right. 

She wonders if her heart had known then what it is so proud of now, and whether her head shut it down completely. 

“Did he say something to you before you left town?” she asks, peering at Colin’s short, scribbled missive. 

“He said he was engaged,” Michael says with a shrug. His eyes skitter away from hers for just a moment. “Perhaps he’s only trying to infuriate you.”

“What a shock that would be,” she mutters dryly. 

“Frankly, I’m shocked he found time to write you at all,” he replies easily. “He is quite newly married. I haven’t written a word to anyone in at least a month and a fortnight.”

A flush rises on her throat, welcome and telling. Smiling slightly, she glances at the postscript. “He wants to visit with Penelope.”

“Perhaps all the freshly married couples of the _ton_ can come visit,” he mutters. 

She sets the letter down and grins at him. “Surely you will become bored of me soon enough,” she teases. 

His eyes darken, color spotting his cheeks. “If the day ever comes, it will be a cold day in hell,” he says quite seriously. 

Perhaps it means she’s a terrible person, but she does like it when he blasphemes for her. “I do like the sound of that,” she muses. 

Grin melting into something much more wicked, he leans back against the back of the settee. “Come over here and I’ll show you something you might like more.”

Wetting her lips, she pushes her chair back from her desk and rises. “You don’t have business to attend to?”

“I’ve done the accounts for the week. Tenant visits are tomorrow,” he says, gaze fixed on her as she approaches. 

“How very responsible,” she says, gathering her skirts in her hands as she moves to sit astride him on the settee. In truth, she likes having some of the responsibilities of the Kilmartin name and estates off of her shoulders. Michael is more equipped for them than anyone ever thought, and while she enjoys the sense of purpose the work brings her, she is more than happy to have someone to share it with. 

“You sound surprised,” he says, mouth curved downwards even as his hands come up to her waist, hauling her closer. Her knees sink into the cushion as the skirt of her day dress bunches between their stomachs. The midday air is cool on her bare legs. 

Francesca tilts her head and wraps her arms around his neck. “I always believed in you,” she says softly, leaning into kiss the taut line of his throat. 

His skin rises into goosebumps under her touch. She opens her mouth and tastes the faint salt-smoke that lingers near his skin; it reminds her of home, of the loamy earth outside these walls she loves, the thick groves of trees. “I had to believe that you would come back,” she whispers against the jumping pulse in his throat. 

The breath hitches in his chest. She feels it against her breasts. “Francesca – “ 

His voice breaks on the last syllable, lost and aching. She presses her nose into the hollow of his throat and breathes, her fingers spreading across the broad spread of his shoulders. “I know why you left,” she says quietly, voice muffled into his collarbones. 

“You,” he says, voice low. “I couldn’t – I – “

“I know now,” she says, sliding her fingers into the hair curling at the nape of his neck. “I’m sorry.”

Hands flinching on her waist, he bows his head to kiss her ear, but says nothing. 

She takes a deep breath and lifts her head to meet his dark gaze. “I was afraid, and hurt. I received every one of your letters, and I began hundreds of replies – “ She pauses, wetting her lips nervously. He is watching her so carefully, so cautiously, his eyes very wide. “I was scared, and I hurt you. And I’m sorry.”

“You – “ he stops, takes a steadying breath. “You wrote me?”

“I tried. Every day for months – for years,” she says, biting the inside of her lip. 

He reaches up to cup her cheek, his mouth curling into a strange half-smile. “All right,” he says before leaning into kiss her. His mouth is wet and warm, opening over hers, as his free hand slides under her bunched skirts to the bare warm skin of her thigh. 

She tunnels her fingers into his thick hair and opens her mouth, her tongue slick and easy against his. Her hips move against his and she breathes his name, trying to inch as close to him as possible. 

“I wish I had sent them,” she whispers once he lets her mouth go to kiss the line of her neck. 

He shakes his head, his palm cupping the warm slick flesh between her thighs. “I know why you didn’t,” he all but growls, fingers teasing her coarse curls before he slides two fingers inside her. “You thought of me, though. You thought of me, and that – “

“Michael – “ she breathes, arching her hips into his hand as her skin quivers. The heat and feel and smell of him surrounds her and she wants to sink into it and never let go. 

“I love you,” he tells her, his thumb circling her clit. “God, Frannie –“

It just pours out of her, the warmth and the love for him. She didn’t think she would ever have this feeling again, and now that it is hers – she cannot let it go, cannot release him. “The settee is too small,” she gasps out as his lips follow the neckline of her dress, grazing it with his teeth and tugging. 

“I’m procuring you a new one,” he mutters, breath hot and moist against her skin. His fingers curl within her and a low sound ekes out of her throat. 

“Not at this very moment you aren’t,” she grounds out.

“Quite bossy, aren’t you.”

She drags his head back up to hers and kisses him with fierce affection, her tongue at the seam of his lips. “I love you,” she pants against his mouth. “I need you.”

In the end, he pours her onto the plush rug underneath them, an echo of their first time in the sitting room a floor and seemingly a world away. She pushes his breeches down just past his thighs and takes his hard length in her hands, stroking with slim fingers. His touch stutters between her thighs and his teeth sink into the exposed curve of her breast, and oh how he shakes under her touch. It is a heady power she has over him, and what he has over her; in anyone else, she thinks she would be frightened of it. But Michael is hers, and she is his, and it is a vow beyond the oaths of church and state. When he slides into her, his clever fingers still at her clit, she arches off of the rug and welcomes the heavy weight of him, the all-encompassing feel of his chest against hers, his hips between her thighs, his mouth at her throat. It is utterly quiver-inducing, shivers racing up and down her spine. All she can do is breathe and moan his name, as he stretches over her and kisses her mouth as they both come. 

They lay there in a patch of sunlight, her skirt rucked up at her waist and his breeches undone, for long moments. When he will move off of her, she wraps her arms around him and holds him fast. She can feel his smile against the curve of her throat. 

“Frannie – “

“Shush,” she murmurs, even as he slips out of her and shifts his weight slightly off to the side. “I like it.”

He meets her eyes, blinking long and easily. His mouth curves into a smile that melts her right through. “I am absolutely procuring a larger settee.”

“Lord, yes,” she murmurs, carding her fingers through his dark hair. 

He tugs his breeches up and settles next to her, an arm heavy at her waist and his face nuzzled at her throat. “Wicked woman.”

“I know,” she says. “I rather like it.”

“I am certainly not protesting,” he laughs, stroking her thigh as he smoothes her skirts over her legs once more. 

“I wouldn’t think so,” she says, and the primness of her voice sends a laugh right out of his throat. She likes to make him laugh.

She loves him, and it’s vicious in its embrace on her heart. 

*

Francesca wakes the next morning to find her courses have come. 

Once Michael is out visiting the tenants after breakfast, a breakfast during which he sits right at her side and holds her hand on top of the smooth polished dining table, she takes a moment, as the maids change the bedding, to weep to herself in the bathing room off of her bedchamber. The tears are silent but too hot to bear, and she presses the heel of her hand hard to her mouth to choke down the whimpers. She hates the control her body has over her, hates the want and need creeping through her empty limbs with each passing month. 

Only once does she wonder if it is a punishment, for being happy twice in a lifetime with two different men. Life, as her other sisters and her mother have said more than once, is already hard enough for women as it is; this seems a cross too far to bear. 

It may never happen, she thinks to herself as she wipes her face and straightens her hair. The maids chatter and rustle the new linens, soft and comforting sounds through the closed door. She may be well and truly barren. Perhaps it is better to accept it now rather than yearn for something that will never be. 

But then again, when has a Bridgerton ever accepted a fate not to their liking?

*

Michael curls up right behind her in bed that night, lays a warm hand over her stomach, and kisses the nape of her neck. Her hair, loose and chestnut and wavy from the pins and braids of the day, he slides it over her shoulder and nestles as close to her as he can. 

She keeps her eyes closed but covers his hand with hers. The tears smart there, behind her eyelids. 

“When – when you sent me away the last time,” he begins after a moment, voice soft in the summer darkness, “I wanted to come in and hold you. I didn’t want you to be alone.”

The Scottish night is a noisy one. Through their open window, for the fresh breeze, she hears songbirds not yet asleep, owls at the start of their night, the rustle of tree branches and leaves in warm winds. It is a comfort, combined with the heat of him at her back. 

“I wanted you to come,” she says at last, voice thick. “But I was frightened.”

He kisses the bare curve of her shoulder, exposed as her nightshift slips over her arm. “Never again,” he murmurs. “There is no need. I will always be here.”

The tears are cold as they slide over her cheek and down her neck into the thick mass of her hair. She’s sure he can smell the salt, taste it somehow. But he says nothing of it. Instead, he merely tucks her closer and kisses her shoulder once more. 

Cold comfort, but comfort nonetheless.

*

August slides into September with an ease she cannot recall from recent years. Michael adeptly handles the apex of harvest season with the tenants, even rolling up his sleeves to pitch in when needed. Francesca writes to her mother, his mother, and her former-mother-in-law inviting them for a visit in October, before the weather turns. Colin writes to say he and Penelope will come after Christmas, once they can leave the house properly for more than two days. 

(She heard enough stories of Colin’s incorrigible behavior at Eloise’s wedding to believe the need for patience.)

Violet Bridgerton writes of Christmas in Kent, a not-so-subtle nudge as to solidifying plans. Francesca sets the letter aside and thinks of a family as large as hers, of the nieces and nephews she loves mightily but are not hers in truth. Hers is a fragile peace between her body and her heart; she isn’t certain it will live through a Bridgerton Christmas, not yet. 

“I wonder if we could Christmas here,” she blurts out to Michael in the smudgy darkness of their bedroom in the middle of September. 

Naked, Michael stretches out next to her and props his elbow on his pillow, resting his head in his hand. The few candles are just enough light to make out the shape of his mouth, the crinkle of his eyes. 

“Alone?” he asks, watching her carefully. 

She sits up, naked as well. Her braided hair reflects gold strands in the candlelight as it sweeps over her shoulder and breast. “Your mother, and Janet perhaps could come up and stay, if they would like.”

“But you do not want to go to Kent.”

She cannot read his gaze, or the curious tone of his voice. “I – no. Not this year,” she says haltingly. 

His stare flickers away. “Is it because of me?”

That startles her more than anything else he could have asked. She gapes, speechless for a moment. Her chest tightens as if preparing for a blow. 

“You? Michael – I don’t understand – “

“Because you married me. I know, your mother and your siblings wrote their pleasure, but they were very fond of John, and – “ he stops, face lined and stormy. 

“They loved John,” she says at last, reaching out to brush the dark hair from his brow. “But they love you too. And I love you. I am so terribly in love with you, and so proud of you.”

He takes her hand in his and brings it to his lips, tongue flickering out against her knuckles. 

“You are my best friend,” she adds, voice so soft she can barely hear it herself. “You’ve been my very best friend for years.”

Eyes bright, he kisses the back of her hand, his lips moving towards her wrist. “Then why?”

Francesca is an inherently logical person. She is precise and thoughtful and, except on rare occasions, will not react irrationally to challenges. This, though, she does not want to think about. There is no logic to her decision apart from her sheer exhaustion, and the empty sensation of a mother without a child surrounded by children who are not hers. 

“Frannie?”

Instead of answering, she shifts over and nudges him onto his back, straddling his stomach. His eyes widen with the action but he does not move or question her. His hands land on her thighs, his gaze traveling up and down her body with frank appreciation. 

“I want to try something,” she says, her thoughts traveling back to their afternoon in the gardener’s cottage.

He smiles slightly. “Is that so?”

“Once, you had said – “ and yes, she is a woman who enjoys intimacy and the more wicked parts of marriage, certainly, but she still flushes at the thought – “that you could kiss me. Like this.”

It is amazing; it takes him less than five seconds to find her meaning. His smile shifts into something positively wolfish, and his hands spread on her thighs. “You are a wicked woman.”

“You married me,” she points out, her hands trembling just the slightest. 

Michael reaches up and cups her breasts in his palms. She moans with the touch, swaying slightly atop his stomach. His clever fingers pinch and circle her nipples under they are taut and pebbled, begging for more. She rests her hands on his chest and whimpers, bracing herself on the solid muscled breadth of him. 

“Lean over, love,” he murmurs, all dark promise in his voice. 

She does as he asks, leaning until his mouth can reach her breasts. He plumps them in his hands and laves the wet attentions of his tongue around her nipples, the undersides of the soft skin. Her hips shift and arch against his stomach; she grows wet with every lick and suck, every graze of teeth. All of her is flushed with desire and need, the sounds spilling out of her mouth low and wanting. 

“Oh god – “ she breathes. 

“C’mere,” he says, voice hoarse. His hands fall to her thighs and nudge her up his chest. “I want it – god, _Frannie_ – “

Taking short breaths, she inches her way up his chest until her knees are at either side of his head and she has to grab hold of the headboard to keep her balance. She watches the smile deepen across his face and his eyes gleam before it’s just the shock of his mouth between her thighs, at the core of her, and she all but shouts with the sensation, a rush of blood to the head and away. There’s nothing to help the rock of her hips, steadied by his hands wrapped around her thighs. The sounds are like hell and heaven, wet and warm and needy. She can feel the vibration of his moans against her slick flesh. 

His tongue curls at her clit and she groans, low and sweet from her very middle. Her fingers clench into the headboard, nails digging into the polished wood as she arches her back. Sweat slips down the groove of her spine as he kisses her without restraint, explores every wet corner of flesh. Pleasure shudders through her and she’s in love, in love with the power and the feel of him underneath her. It is Michael she loves for this, Michael who embraces all the secret dark parts of herself, and as she comes with a cry of his name, his hands clench on her thighs and she knows, she knows he understands. 

“Oh _god_ ,” she pants, pushing herself away and falling to her back. “My _god_ , Michael – “

He looms over her, mouth damp in the dim candlelight. He wipes the back of his hand over his mouth and she reaches for him, every part of her sensitive and aching for touch. Her thigh curves over his hip and he sinks into her with little warning, hard and wanting. She sighs into it, clutching at the muscled expanse of his back as she searches for his mouth. In his kiss she tastes the lingering remnants of herself, and it’s one of the most arousing moments in her life. 

“You are _everything_ ,” he breathes against her mouth, low sound ripping from his throat as if he is in pain. But there is only the rhythm of his hips moving in time with hers, and the shudders of another climax rippling through her. His clever fingers slip between their sweat-damp bodies to find her clit and she is gone, quivering and moaning his name as he follows her suit. Everything is heavy and dark as she shuts her eyes, welcomes the weight of his shaking body against hers. 

God, how she loves him. 

“I liked that,” she tells him once she can remember how to speak, her voice hoarse. 

Sprawled out next to her, he moans very softly. “Good god, wife.”

“You told me you liked it when I told you,” she says, slightly off-put. 

He gathers her sweat-damp body in his arms and pulls her against his chest. She rests her cheek against his shoulder and smoothes her hand over his dark-furred chest. “I do like it. You’re going to be the end of me,” he murmurs, the tone of his voice deep and dark enough to send shudders over her skin anew. 

Smiling, she kisses his shoulder and shuts her eyes again. 

But he is tenacious, her Michael. 

“Is it because of your siblings’ children?” he asks after a long while of summer night noise, the wind whistling through the trees. 

She doesn’t breathe for a moment, her hand flat on his chest right over his heart. 

“It’s all right,” he says quietly. “It’s all right if it is.”

“It – it can’t be all right,” she says after a moment, voice cracking. “I am so utterly selfish.”

He kisses the top of her hair, strokes his hand down her back. His fingertips glide into the groove of her spine. “You are not. It’s hard, that’s all. It’s bloody hard.”

She presses herself to him, hitches her thigh over his waist. She wants to be as close to him as physically possible, and he lets her, draws her in even. 

“I also want you to myself still,” she says quietly. 

His laugh is low and soft. She feels it rumble in his chest. “I am only yours.”

It is more than a promise when he says it. And when he kisses her, his mouth soft and open against hers, there is no judgment. She takes comfort in it, with no apologies or regrets. 

*

One week later, Francesca walks into her study with a bundle of letters and newspapers fresh from the mail, and halts. 

A brand-new settee sits flush against the window, a lovely scarlet hue. It is long and wide, and much larger than she could ever hope to need for her private study. 

A grin crosses her mouth. She drops the mail onto her clean desktop and turns on her heel to find Michael. 

Some things require testing and practice. She is nothing if not practical. 

*


End file.
